‘Imprinting’ is a complex mental process that leads the puppy to consider man as a fellow and then to seek contact with him. Only pups that received a good imprinting may become useful dogs, well socialized and ready to work with the man.
Understand the imprinting
To receive a proper imprinting, puppies should be in constant contact with different people: they must sniff, play with them, to be taken in their arms. If this is not done or is done with only one person, imprinting may be missing or incomplete, and then give an adult dog that is not fully socialized and will be difficult to educate and train.
Individuals are generally unaware of the importance of imprinting (they do not even know what that means) but most of the time, having a home range led family members to move lot of time with the dogs and this problem is solved automatically, without even being raised.
Risk can arise in the absence of family if there is a single person in the house and there she was manipulating the puppies, the risk of imprinting focus on this one person and not the human species, as it should be. A farm, known in general this problem and tries to provide a good imprinting the dog.
However, if several litters born at the same time and that the breeder is a little overwhelmed, it may happen that this imprinting is defective or incomplete. It is for all these reasons, it is strongly recommended to run this test as soon as you have identified the scope of your dreams.
Age: between thirty and forty days, if you still have the possibility to intervene in correcting potential negative results. The test can also be run fifty or sixty days: responses obtained are reliable, but they are final and can not be corrected.
Location: since the young age of puppies, the test can be performed in livestock or the owner’s house in the scope (including a garden if the weather is nice).
Duration: about a quarter of an hour.
Who should perform the test? An adult who is not known puppies (you, for example).
Test Procedure Come to the scope to wander, without speaking or making sudden movements. Sit in the middle of the puppies and watch their reactions.
What are the puppies?
– Puppies rush immediately to inspect you and sniff you, they invite you to play and take liberties with you: All members of the scope have been a very good imprinting: you can buy without hesitation one of the puppies being sure it will be your companion and even a friend.
– Puppies revolve around you, with an air interested but they keep a safe distance, some of them show an early aggressive reaction (growling, barking). After a few minutes, the bravest of them begin to approach quickly and all puppies take liberties with you: Imprinting is still incomplete: there may be a slight delay in the breeder in establishing a rapport with her pups, or topics that need more time. It may also be an imprinting focused on one person. Must then run a cons-test by repeating the test a week later about: whether the behavior of puppies is more friendly, there is no problem. If the puppies always have the same reactions, ask the breeder to take your place among them: then they show similar reactions to the above cases, you’re dealing with an imprinting focused on one person. Ask the breeder what he intends to do in the coming days: he did not have the opportunity to know other people with puppies, socialization may be incomplete. If you really want a topic of this scope, you can still hear with the breeder back and see the puppies with a friend or parent the following week. Do you sniff by puppies, touch them and play with them for half an hour a day: it may be sufficient to carry the imprinting his term.
– The puppies run to hide in a corner, apparently frightened by human presence: Puppies completely lack imprinting: this is a dangerous situation because it is irreversible once they have passed the age of eight weeks . These puppies will become hopelessly dogs ‘wild’ and fearing man, difficult to impossible to educate and train. At thirty-five or forty days, we can still save the situation: I suggest you speak with the breeder, ask him what he thinks to do about it and make your choices based on their answers. Devoid of a puppy imprinting should absolutely not be purchased. However, if you still have time to remedy this, you can deal personally with the help of friends, as we have seen in the previous one (of course, if the farmer agrees). This obviously requires a certain willingness on your part.
